My students are hard to motivate (especially at this time of year!). Way back at the beginning of the year, I thought about all of the online resources that motivated me as a student. These were the Top Three that I consistently used (and got positive feedback on!) throughout the year. Enjoy!
#1 STUDYBLUE. I remember loving Studyblue because I absolutely hated the amount of time it took me to write out vocabulary words on flashcards. With Studyblue, all I had to do was type! {Side note: They even give you suggestions from what other users of Studyblue have done}. Now, as a teacher, I love Studyblue even MORE. I can make my students online flashcards, sign them up, and then they have no excuse! It's fun, they can quiz themselves using the flashcards or the quiz. If they get a certain amount wrong, they can go back and quiz themselves on the ones they are having a hard time with!
#1 STUDYBLUE. I remember loving Studyblue because I absolutely hated the amount of time it took me to write out vocabulary words on flashcards. With Studyblue, all I had to do was type! {Side note: They even give you suggestions from what other users of Studyblue have done}. Now, as a teacher, I love Studyblue even MORE. I can make my students online flashcards, sign them up, and then they have no excuse! It's fun, they can quiz themselves using the flashcards or the quiz. If they get a certain amount wrong, they can go back and quiz themselves on the ones they are having a hard time with!
#2 CONJUGUEMOS: This website allows students to practice conjugations using a self-timed test. You, the teacher, can create or use other teachers' activities for the students to complete for homework (or in class!). For instance, my Spanish 1 students are doing Irregular Present tense verbs, while my Spanish 2 students are doing Irregular Preterite verbs. The best part? After students log in, they press "Send/Record," and it automatically sends me an email, telling me their accuracy percentage and the time that they took to complete it. This is great for me because it is self-evaluation as well as teacher-evaluation. I get to see how well students are understanding a tense before they even step foot in my classroom that day!
Although I really advocate students learning Spanish through real-life scenarios, authentic resources, and conversation, it is still important that they know and understand conjugations (and if they can start to get this outside the classroom, that's even better!).
Conjuguemos does ask for $50 to subscribe to their services, but I would say that it's totally worth it. It definitely beats students half-doing a worksheet of boring conjugations! It makes it somewhat competitive and fun! (They can also do this with vocab, but I like Studyblue better for vocab practice!)
Conjuguemos does ask for $50 to subscribe to their services, but I would say that it's totally worth it. It definitely beats students half-doing a worksheet of boring conjugations! It makes it somewhat competitive and fun! (They can also do this with vocab, but I like Studyblue better for vocab practice!)
#3 Prezi: Prezi is the bomb mainly because it's hard for me to figure out PowerPoint. I love Prezi because it's easy to save & re-open on different devices, and it truly is fun to make and to present! Of course, being an excellent presenter is more important, but Prezi has this weird ability to make even the most boring presentation a little bit more bearable. Plus, it's easy to add Youtube videos, pictures, and it forces you to add information in smaller bits. I love it!